CSW Resilience Team Termly School Newsletter
The CSW Resilience Team comprises of Emergency Planning Officers that represent the local authorities of Coventry, Solihull and Warwickshire. We enable compliance with the Civil Contingencies Act through risk assessments, business continuity, training and exercising, recovery and supporting the planning and response to incidents.
The theme of this term’s newsletter is logging and keeping records during an emergency. Logs are vital for evidencing decisions which were made during an incident, giving decision makers the ability to explain their rationale and provide a clear audit trail should their decisions be questioned after the event.
What to do
Some of the things you will record in a log:
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· Times · Dates · Names · Objectives · Important information & situational awareness |
· Decisions made · Options discounted · Decisions reviewed · Actions requested/carried out · Rationale · Outcomes |
What not to do
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· Don’t scribble out mistakes · Don’t tear out pages · Avoid adding in loose extra pages, secure them · Don’t write between lines |
· Don’t actively take part in decision making · Don’t make the tea · Don’t leave blank lines & big empty spaces |
What to do if you need to change the log
- If you need to make amendments in a log book, cross out with a single line and initial then carry on with the correction
- If being asked to amend an electronic log, use the strikethrough function and initial it as you would if you were writing a physical log
- Crossings out must still be legible to see what was removed.
A video has been developed by the CSW Resilience Team to help loggists to know the role they will play during an emergency –
Loggist Training Video For CSW Resilience Team
We encourage during an emergency for the key decision makers (this might be the headteacher) assigns a loggist who they work closely with and understands how they work to be their designated loggists during an emergency to track the decisions made and the rational behind the decisions.
As we commence a new calendar year, we are encouraging you to forward think about what you could do this year to ensure your emergency planning arrangements make you prepared to respond to any incident that might occur in your school.
We hope you have had a great winter break and have had a safe return this term. Please do not hesitate to contact me regarding your school’s emergency planning arrangements.
Kind Regards,
CSW Resilience Team
Email: CSWRT@warwickshire.gov.uk